Читать книгу Unexpected - Lori Foster - Страница 10

Chapter Four

After they stuffed their baggage behind the seat, Ray tossed Eli the keys and told him to drive.

“Really?”

Well, what about that? She’d expected an argument, not a look of anticipation, as if getting behind the wheel of her battered truck appealed to him. “Yeah, really. You do know how to drive a stick, don’t you?”

“Learned when I was ten, as a matter of fact.”

“Ten?”

“Yeah. I was a . . . rambunctious kid.” He adjusted the seat to fit his longer legs, turned the key, and smiled at the low rumble of the engine. “Know what I think, Ray?”

She wasn’t sure she wanted to. But he didn’t wait for her to ask anyway.

“I think most of the wear and tear on your truck is camouflage, kind of like your blustering and bravado.”

That tore it. “Blustering and bravado?”

He put the truck in gear and drove out of the lot, shifting with practiced ease. “The truck looks bad, but it’s a real gem.” He flicked a look her way. “You can pretend to be cold and heartless, but you’re a sensitive woman.”

Being compared to her truck wasn’t the best compliment. In a flat voice, she said, “The windows are bulletproof and the frame is reinforced with body armor. It doesn’t matter how the truck looks, Eli. It’s a kick-ass machine, meant to get me safely where I’m going, not for joyriding.”

His big hands opened and closed on the steering wheel in a near caress. Mesmerized by that, Ray almost missed it when he murmured, “A fast, fun joyride wouldn’t hurt anything now, would it?”

Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. Was he talking about the damn truck, or her? It didn’t matter, not when her mind took the comment in the most explicit, sexual way possible. Damn it, how did he keep doing this to her? She wanted to put him in his place, she really did.

Only at the moment, she wasn’t sure where that might be.

She slouched in her seat, propped her feet on the dash and turned her face to stare out her window. She’d ignore him and his innuendoes.

The problem was, she knew he was looking at her. She could feel his gaze, moving over her, filling her with throbbing turbulence. Eli was not a man to be ignored, in any way, shape, or form.

“You’re awfully quiet, Ray. What’s the problem now?”

“I’m thinking.” She slanted him a look, her sense of injustice rising. “Maybe you should try it rather than indulging all this idle chitchat.”

“Getting on your nerves, am I?”

He didn’t sound the least contrite. “Yes, actually you are.” His hands were still now, and that allowed her gaze to zero in on something she could tackle without unsettling emotion. “I see you didn’t take the watch off like I told you to.”

“My watch stays.”

She was ready for a confrontation. “No, it doesn’t. If it’s noticed in Mataya, we’ll have our hands full getting out with your arm intact.”

Eli merely grinned at her. “I trust you to take care of me, Ray. That is what you promised Jane, remember?”

She resented having her own words thrown back at her. She resented more the fact that she’d had to promise Jane anything. “It looked to me like you needed some help getting rid of the lady.” And with a sneer: “Is she always that clingy?”

“Not usually, no.”

That wasn’t enough of an answer to suit her. “She hinted you two haven’t exactly been . . . close.”

Eli chuckled. “You mean sexually?”

The turbulence expanded, feeling almost like pain. “Yeah. So why her sudden change of heart?”

“Her heart wasn’t involved, Ray. Just her tactical mind.”

“What do you mean?”

Eli grimaced as if pained. “My grandfather is playing Cupid. He wants our two families to join, and evidently, given her recent performance, Jane is all for it.”

He couldn’t possibly mean . . . Skeptically, Ray asked, “A business alliance?”

Eli shook his head. “My grandfather is old-fashioned. He likes to keep it in the family.”

Her heart skipped two beats. “Meaning?”

“Marriage.”

She didn’t care, she didn’t care, she did not care. “Why the hell would she marry you if she didn’t love you?”

That had him laughing, but not for the reasons Ray thought. “You make marriage to me sound like a heinous fate worse than death.” His laugh was nice and deep. Real. “Our marriage would unite major competitors in the same industry. It’d be a match made in boardroom heaven.”

Because her privacy was so important to her, it amazed Ray that Eli didn’t seem to have an aversion to discussing his private affairs. “So you’re supposed to marry a woman for the sake of money?”

He frowned at her curt generalization. “That was the plan, I suppose, though I never agreed to it.”

Ray didn’t bother trying to hide her shock. “That’s disgusting. How much money do you people need, anyway?”

“I never said—”

Anger brought her feet off the dash to land on the floor with a thud. “Marriages of convenience went out a long time ago.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “The whole idea is pathetic.”

Eli absorbed her annoyance with a slow smile. “Are you willing to make me a better offer?”

Her arms fell to her sides. “Now what are you babbling about?”

“I haven’t fallen in love with anyone yet, including Jane, but I’m thirty-three. It’s time for me to settle down and start a family of my own.”

“Do wealthy people have a schedule for that sort of thing?”

“Not a schedule, no, but I do have a responsibility, especially to my grandfather to carry on the tradition of a family-run business. I can’t very well do that without more family.” He reached over and patted her knee. “Just think of the strong, independent kids we’d have.”

She shoved his hand away. “You aren’t the least bit funny, Eli.”

He laughed again and Ray thought about socking him. In the end, she decided that would only inconvenience her, since she’d be the one to have to take care of him afterward.

“What’s the matter, Ray? Don’t you want to supply me with a couple of small Connors to carry on the family name? I promise I’d be a good dad.”

Oh, she believed that. He’d probably be a wonderful dad. But the idea of her as a mother was utterly ludicrous. She didn’t think she’d ever held a baby, much less cared for one.

A little melancholy, Ray leaned her head back on the seat and closed her eyes, all but dismissing Eli. But she couldn’t refrain from one last parting shot. “It appears to me Jane is now more than anxious to give you as many heirs as you want.”

“Ray,” he chided in a more mellow tone, “you don’t need to concern yourself about Jane.”